We filed into class and took our seats behind the computers. They were high-tech, top-ofthe-line and brand-new. They had been funded by the parents’ association—my mother was the president. The only thing that wasn’t brand-new and high-tech in our computer room was our teacher, Mrs. Carson.
To be fair, she wasn’t a computer teacher. She was the music teacher at our school. She just didn’t know much about computers. Just like Mr. Roberts did for Mrs. Orr, Mrs. Carson gave the regular computer teacher, Ms. Brown, planning time. Ms. Brown taught every grade in the school except ours. I guess that made some sense. We were the oldest kids, so we already knew lots about computers. Certainly more than Mrs. Carson would ever know.
She was a great music teacher though. She played the piano, the guitar and the trumpet. She had a wonderful singing voice. She directed the school play and even wrote songs for it. She was the director of the choir. Unfortunately none of those skills had anything to do with computers. The only keyboard she cared about was on her piano.
“Good afternoon, class,” Mrs. Carson said. “Today we are going to be…going to be…”
She looked down at the lesson plan Ms. Brown had left her. It was sad that somebody who could perform so well with music was so helpless in this class.
“Oh, yes, we’re going to be learning about sending emails.”
There was a groan from the class.
“I know that most of you have probably sent an email or two in your life, but Ms. Brown has left me with a very detailed lesson plan on the correct format for emails.”
Great. In one class we had to write letters, and in this one we had to email—wait!
I grabbed my binder and flipped through the pages until I found the reply from the Raptors. I’d wanted to throw it out, but I’d kept it—after all, it was from the Raptors. I ran my finger down the page, looking for something…there it was.
Mrs. Carson continued to read from the lesson plan. Nobody was paying any attention. Maybe if she sang the instructions that would have worked.
“Are there any questions?” she asked.
I got the feeling she was really, really hoping nobody would have any questions, and then she wouldn’t have to try to give an answer to a question she didn’t even understand.
“In that case, everybody should get to work on their email,” she said.
She sat down at the desk and I got up. I walked to the front board, carrying the letter with me. I picked up a piece of chalk and in big letters started to print out an email address.
“Nick?” Mrs. Carson asked.
“I’m just writing down an email address…you know…for the assignment.”
“Oh, that’s good,” she said.
I finished writing out the address.
“For anybody who’s interested,” I said, “this is the email address for the lady at the Raptors who turned down our first request to have a Raptor come to our school.”
“We should email her and tell her she’s a jerk,” Greg said.
“No!” I exclaimed. “I thought that maybe we could email her and ask her again to have somebody come. We could tell her that the invitation is still on.”
“That is a great idea,” Kia said. “And if everybody emails her, then maybe she’ll rethink the whole thing.”
“Everybody wrote letters and look how much good that did,” Ashley chimed in.
“Not all of us,” Kia said pointedly.
“Do you really think my letter would have made that big a difference?” Ashley asked.
“Twenty-six would have been better than twenty-two,” Kia snapped.
“But not as good as seventy or eighty,” Lailah added.
She stood up and everybody looked at her. She looked so confident. Funny—the way she was standing there so calmly reminded me of the way Kia stood on the line waiting to take a free throw.
“You can’t seriously think that we should all write three emails,” Ashley said.
“No. I was thinking that we could have everybody in the three grade-six classes send her an email,” Lailah replied.
“That’s right. Mrs. Carson, you teach all three of the grade-six classes, and they’re all going to have to do this assignment, aren’t they?” I asked.
“Yes, all three,” Mrs. Carson confirmed.
“So wouldn’t it be simpler if all the classes did the same thing? Wouldn’t that be easier for you to explain to them? If that’s okay with you, of course.”
“I don’t see why not,” Mrs. Carson agreed.
“I could talk to them about it,” I said.
“If you want to talk to them, that would be fine,” she said.
“Can I go and talk to them now?” I asked.
She looked hesitant.
“That way there would be fewer questions for you to answer,” I added.
I saw the hesitation start to lift.
“It won’t take me long, and I’ll be back in time to finish my email.”
She shrugged. “It sounds like a wonderful idea!”
“Thanks. And could I bring somebody with me?”
“Of course.”
Kia started to get up.
“Take Lailah with you,” Mrs. Carson said.
Kia looked shocked and quickly settled back into her seat, hoping nobody had noticed. Some people had seen her start to get up.
“It might be better if there were three of us. Could—”
“Two is just fine,” Mrs. Carson said.
Lailah stood up, pushed in her chair and smiled. There was something about her smile… but she looked sort of…sort of…I don’t know, pretty. I glanced over at Kia. She looked as unhappy as Lailah looked happy.